Sweetest Downfall
by zumanity ringmaster
Summary: A response to Aerileigh's Soundtrack Challenge. An older Ginny looks back at the truth of the war, the light that got her through it, and the darkness at the end of the tunnel. Rated M, for a bit of language towards the end.


A/N: I obviously don't own Harry Potter. This story is for Aerileigh's Soundtrack Challenge. This is the first track "Samson" by Regina Spektor

"Grandma! Grandma!" A small ash blonde bounced out of her grandmother's small cottage in Wales near Ceibwr Bay. She was carrying a book almost the size of her, and with effort she put it on the patio table and clambered on to the chair next to it.

The two women sitting at the table looked at the girl. Two more different women could never be imagined. One was old, her porcelain features lined in an attractive way framing a pair of twinkling brown eyes and a head of flaming hair. The other was younger, the little girls mother, with platinum blonde hair and her fathers grey eyes, her skin was smooth as glass.

"Aliena, what is this?" Her mother flipped open the book.

"Close the book, Cissa." The older woman said quietly. But it was too late, the book was opened, and Cissa gasped.

"Mum, is this?" Cissa turned the book to face her mother.

Brown eyes looked down at the book, and at the first page. On that page was a smiling man, not much older than 21, trying to throw a squirming small redheaded woman into the ocean. The people in the small wizard photo noticed they had an audience, and started waving frantically at the three generations of witches.

"Yes, Cissa." Ginny Weasly looked at her daughter, "That is your father. His name was Draco Malfoy, and you are named after his mother."

Cissa's pale face went a shade paler. "But, Mum. He was a traitor."

Ginny's eyes went cold and fierce, "Never, ever, ever, talk about your father that way, do you understand me Narcissa Mary Weasly."

Cissa, cowed by her mothers temper, nodded and agreed to it silently.

"Now that's taken care of, time for lunch." Ginny snapped the book closed and took it up to her room.

Later that night when her daughter and granddaughter had left for the night, staying with the other Weaslys at a converted granary nearby, Ginny opened the book again.

It had been so long, so very long. It hurt to look at the pages full of newspaper clippings and pictures. In those pages was the truth that she had hidden for over 30 years. It wasn't that she had wanted to hide it, it had been hidden for her. Harry in a jealous fit had never mentioned what Draco has done after he found that she was pregnant. The reporters, the history authors who had written the history of the war, none had ever asked.

Ginny looked back to the book, where there was a lock of Draco's hair. She smiled at it. Draco had had long hair when she met him in the middle of the war.

The war had stretched from England across Europe. The aging professor of Muggle Studies at Beauxbaton had written and published a pamphlet about Voldemort, comparing him to Adolf Hitler, saying that Voldemort was no more than a pitiful wizarding version of the dictator and that if history was to be believed, Voldemort would fail and be "left in a ditch, dead, covered in Muggle Petrol burning."

Voldemort had killed the professor himself, but the pamphlet had turned into a prophecy.

That was what had led Ginny to America. Hermione had remembered that the Americans had helped Europe before. But America was also being courted by the Death Eaters, Draco had been their representative.

Something had happened, Ginny could never explain it after that. It was only magical in a way that someone who had been raised a witch could call magical. They had decided to leave, forget the war, and live. They came together in a way that left sparks flying, and angels singing.

They had lived three years together before Draco was found by Voldemort. They had been lying under the stars in Wyoming, the place they had settled due to it's remoteness after traveling. As they lay watching the Leonid meteor shower, the Dark Mark had appeared above them. Draco was captured and Ginny fled back to war torn England.

From there, they had tried to follow through with their promise to each other. If they survived the war, or if they were captured and had to return to battle, they would fight against the pillars of the war—racism, hatred, fear, anger, revenge. But they never made a dent. Ginny had persuaded the Order that Draco was good, and even got information from him. They were so close to their end goal.

Then the end came. The night before what was later known as the Final Battle, Ginny and Draco lay together in each other arms, making love until dawn when they had to separate.

In the battle Draco had been killed, and when Ginny had begged for his body, she had been turned down. She had sobbed, and in her despair cast a pregnancy charm on herself, in the desperate hope that she had gotten pregnant. She had, and Harry had been livid.

Ginny winced as she remembered the words that had spewed from Harry's mouth as she knelt sobbing in a mixture of relief and happiness and extreme pain.

"Whore! You are a goddamned whore, Ginevera Weasly! Did you think he loved you? He probably never did. He probably ran off with you, just so he could get laid and then lure you back to Voldemort, to hurt me. I hope you got a good fuck out of it, because no one will touch you now, you know it. I won't even touch you, and I've been slumming it with the little fuck toys the Death Eaters play with so I could get information. You'll never be worth anything." Harry had changed during 10 years of war.

Ginny had bought her little cottage and raised her daughter. At age 11, Narcissa had become closer and closer to the other Weaslys, a group that Ginny rarely talked to after they took Harrys side. The only one she had talked to was George, since he understood what it was like to loose the other half.

Narcissa had married Harry and Hermione's son, James Sirus Remus Severus Albus Potter, and they had a little daughter, Lilly Petunia Andromeda.

Ginny sighed. It was time to go. She picked up her book, and her portkey and was whisked away to Wyoming. She steadied herself, looked at the cabin she still lived in part of the year, and walked to the back where the garden was in bloom. There was a headstone at the back, and she placed her book infront of it.

"You have always been my sweetest downfall my love. I have always loved you first."


End file.
